I've been thinking more on this. I have found a way to shorten the length of soccer games without really affecting the outcome that much. Instead of playing two halves like they do now, any time teams of even remotely the same skill level play each other they can play only 20 minutes or so. First though, before the start of the game both teams can choose one representative to come out to pay a quick two out of three serious of Rock Paper Scissors. The winner of that will start the game off with a point. It sounds ridiculous, but sadly with the way random chance and luck dominate over actual skill because of it's low scoring and strategies that play off of that, statistically I wouldn't be surprised if everything tended to end up about the same. All it would really do would be to expose the randomness for what it really is and not waste anybody's time
That's the big problem with me, the biggest out of very many of them that I listed on page two of this thread. (And I'm sure if I really put more time into thinking about it I could come up with even more.) Others try to say it's elegant or what have you, but really it's just blind luck imitating as elegance. A dance is beautiful with nice movements because everybody can see it for what it is, and it‘s not competing against something else. Soccer isn't the beautiful sport because essentially it's fake. It's artificial excitement. Half the game (and lets be honest, there's a good chance it's even more than that) is essentially a game of luck where one team just happened to metaphorically draw the short straw or chose paper when the other team chose scissors. I would also mention that with the incredibly low scoring things like a single missed call or wrong call can pretty much single handedly change the game, and have absolutely nothing to do directly with the players on the field. Some flopper and get a call and pretty much win the game because of that. In a sport like basketball for instance even if a team totally screws up or a ref makes a bad call and allows the other team to get a dunk uncontested or shot a couple of free throws, if they are better than them that might only mean they beat them 90-82 instead of 90-80. It's the same with pretty much every other major sport in the world...except soccer. In soccer if one team manages to get a quirky goal they have pretty much won the lottery. Even in hockey or American football if a team scores on another one it’s not time to worry, because if you play to good the rest of the game there is a good chance you can still win. In soccer if that happens your pretty much screwed most of the time.
See that's a problem. I believe the very spirit and nature of competition should be played so the better people can win because they have a significant advantage over the people they are better than. They should have that significant advantage in every game they play. That’s a very large chunk of the whole reason we have competition and sports in the first place. Sure, luck, randomness, and other things play apart of every sport. Sure, upsets happen in every sport. Sure, some times a good team will just not play up to it's abilities while a worse one will play better than usual. Soccer takes those first two to the nth degree though. There is a difference between those aspects playing subservient part in a sport because there is no way to eliminate it and it playing a part where it dominates the sport. Soccer is the latter. I could also claim it makes things like upsets totally meaningless. Upsetting an superior opponent is a great accomplishment in pretty much every other major sport. On the other hand, if you have such a great chance of winning or tying already it doesn't mean that much in that context. You just pulled off a slight statistical improbability. Who cares when “any team can win” when that’s the situation.
Basically it all boils down to each side playing not to lose and hoping the other can make a mistake first or some fluke incidence happens in your favor so you can pounce. What kind of sport doesn't one side go out and make it happen? Sure if you play enough games in a season eventually the better team will win more. Regression to the mean as a aspect of statistics even works for soccer..........eventually. I'm sure that's why the same few teams seem to win in the European leagues for what seems like the last decade or two. Then again a lot of that is due to the skill level gulf between the best teams in those leagues and the worst is so absurdly great that even the little bit of the game that does rely on skill is enough to give them an edge. It would be like an NFL team playing a mediocre college one.
The spatial awareness needed aren't any greater than most other major sports. Hockey and basketball needs more, plus one needs to be quicker in it. American football is probably the greatest "chess match" ever created where each side is always trying to outsmart, outmaneuver, and deceive the other as much as they are trying to plain execute. You can't really tell me the beauty of Soccer is in some maneuvering or strategy that different than don't screw up before the other team does. Sure it takes endurance, but then again when one takes the amount the run divided over the time they are out there, it’s not really that great of a feat.
What I would really like though is that for all those people that think we don’t “understand” it to tell us what makes the game worthwhile. WHAT ARE WE NOT UNDERSTANDING? Because frankly I’m not seeing it even being as objective about it as I can be. Really if you think it’s a great game as a professional sport and not some non-serious recreational actively people can pick up because it’s cheap tell me why. After giving it as fair of a chance as I can I find it very wanting. Is it’s false elegance really that exciting? Is it’s passive nature really that great? Is it’s fluky nature that much of a thrill?
True, most of the world likes it, but it makes me think of part of a statement Tommy Lee Jones’ character in Men in Black once said. It went something like, “A person is smart. People are dumb.” It makes me wonder if this might be one of those things that fits that statement.
As far as sports go Americans got it right.
